Our readings for Sunday are here.
The following are the poems, my notes, and interpretation of Fr Dennis’ homily from the Mass of
- September 28, 2014 5PM
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The poem Fr Dennis references is:
- 2014 homily — One Good Thing by Edwin Romond
- 2014 homily — Genius by Billy Collins
In 2014
- All three readings engage with humanity’s (need and) duties of accepting change and growing through, out, and beyond anger to forgiveness. We need to release and change (or grow, however you prefer to characterize the transformation).
- Yet, how do we know what needs to be let go of, or the like? From our daily Examen (the Jesuit daily prayer, not the general Catholic Examination of Conscience).
- From rl — The Jesuit Examen is a prayer presented in many styles and forms, encapsulating the four / five encounters:
- Presence — I choose to be with God in this moment.
- Review of the day — think of it like a film reel of your life in this day playing out before you. Notice your feelings throughout; notice what you notice. 🙂 (And practice the skill of seeing what you don’t see or choose not to see, too.)
- Gratitude for those blessings and beautiful, joyful, kind, or loving moments I have received.
- Contrition and hope for those moments in my day in which I have been challenged or simply did not respond in kindness or love.
- Openness and hope for the day ahead, a prayer that I might meet and greet God in the world, and do so in the way God wishes, or 🙂 The Way :-).
- Conclude with the Our Father (or an appropriate prayer of your tradition invoking humility, wonder, gratitude, service, and community, i.e., Our Father, not My Father.
- Once when I asked D2 how he built his habit of praying the Examen, that I was struggling a bit with the demands of work, etc., he mused and with a kind chuckle and smile at the remembrance noted that the Novitiate rang a chime, and every Jesuit in the building dropped what they were doing and prayed the Examen for whatever time was allocated. Somehow he knew how to teach the importance of the practice and acknowledge that “civilian” life bore its own challenges and graces in living our faith, just as while some aspects of our faith were made simpler by being in formation to be a priest, other aspects were more difficult. The compass heading to God remains the same and the path has to be one of love, kindness, and a joyful heart.
- From rl — The Jesuit Examen is a prayer presented in many styles and forms, encapsulating the four / five encounters:
- Back to D2 — The practice of our daily Examen helps us know “one good thing” when it happens, as Edwin Romond’s poem so clearly shares. Likewise, Billy Collins’ poem, “Genius” also captures the unfolding and waiting needed, as Romond writes, “to turn emptiness into ecstasy.”
And I (re)used the photo of a ruby-throated hummingbird because my garden and feeders have been feeding the return migration of hummies, much to my delight. I see these photos of dozens of hummies at feeders, all congregating and darting in and out. Not so for my feeders and garden.
The other night, one peripatetic hummingbird was trying to feed at the feeder but kept darting the three feet back to the garden to scare off another hummie that was extracting nectar from one of the hundred blooms remaining in the garden. So, in a roughly 6′ by 12′ area that were two feeders with 6 drinking holes and 100 active blooms ….
… but apparently room for only one hummingbird, according to the wee bossy one, who eventually entered a full scale chase away of the interloper. Too bad, as soon as they left, a third hummie came right up and enjoyed an undisturbed feast at the feeder!
